In early 2009, Jan Venulet (JV), gratefully agreed to the suggestion by the President of the International Society of Pharmacovigilance (ISoP) to write "a chapter or two" on the earlier periods of pharmacovigilance. The purpose of ISoP’s project, to which several others will also contribute, is "to collect the memories of the beginning of pharmacovigilance with the objective to put it on the website for future generations". The second author, Margaretha Helling- Borda (MHB), invited by JV to collaborate on this walk down memory lane of the WHO’s International Drug Monitoring, was also part of the early and formative years, 1968–1975...